A note from Chiara Guidi
The tree in different cultures symbolizes wisdom. Jack climbs along a tree going from the earth to the sky, and from the sky back to the earth. He goes up and down many times. He goes beyond the sky, away from the earth – then he returns home. While moving from place to place, Jack is connecting what is down with what is up, giving the narrative a metaphorical function. The action of going up and down, ascending and descending, are the magical verbs for transformation! Jack invites us to climb up to extend our vision towards frontiers nourished by our imagination which ‘fairytale’ makes possible and concrete, because they are part of reality itself.

A note from Jeff Stein
Since the first Bean was planted, some 15 years ago, when I first saw the work of Raffaello Sanzio, till today when the stalk of this project has finally grown, it has been a hard but rewarding journey. Firstly there was the incredible inspiration of
Chiara Guidi and Raffaello Sanzio, secondly the Australia Council fellowship that allowed me to research, then Campbelltown Arts Centre to give us a context to explore and develop, Erth to realise the vision and finally Insite Arts and Adelaide Festival to move this project to its finality and reality. At times I have had to be Jack and scramble to climb with reckless abandon, at other times the Ogre and be brutal and stomp my way through. I’d really like to thank one and all who at various
times participated in this journey and helped make it possible, especially Chiara for her unrelenting passion for theatre and to my son Harpo, who I hope will one day dream, imagine, climb, plunder and pilage, all in the name of art.